


Dreaming of You

by wdywa_tfawmeao



Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: (i love ronan lynch), Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, M/M, Realization, Ronan Lynch Loves Adam Parrish, i still think about that tomato dream everyday, its not even that angsty tho lol, k i'll stop, look for the deeper meaning ronan, old adam, pynch - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-25
Updated: 2020-06-25
Packaged: 2021-03-04 06:01:43
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,147
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24918766
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wdywa_tfawmeao/pseuds/wdywa_tfawmeao
Summary: (Alternative Title: 'White Ferrari,' Frank Ocean)Ronan keeps dreaming of older Adam and he doesn't know why.(“Why are you here?” Ronan asked.The Adam in front of him smiled and said nothing. He only picked more strawberries and placed them in the basket.“Seriously. I know you’re here a lot but why are you older again?”)
Relationships: Ronan Lynch/Adam Parrish
Comments: 6
Kudos: 118





	Dreaming of You

**Author's Note:**

> Again before I start this, I wanted to talk about the BLM movement.  
> Please keep up with this movement. Everything is going back to "normal" and I really hate seeing that. Stay informed, spread information, help in anyway you can. Just don't let this die down. Everyone has a voice and we need to continue to use it.
> 
> EDIT: *petitions and donations*   
> [DOC 1](https://docs.google.com/document/d/12NOKxJwH1zTM7_LaiPZCPw48vcHmVGktMgXIKHYWXxY/edit)  
> [DOC 2](https://docs.google.com/document/d/1yxj0kSC2-LzINUlfNMEV_Qi-7ZtWCTLSua3Z-9XFNqA/edit)  
> [CARRD](https://blacklivesmatters.carrd.co/)

It was the same damn dream. 

Adam, with a handsome stubble, bulkier chest, and this new face. Sure, it still held the boyish features that Ronan knew and loved, but there were less of them, and they were masked with a blatant matureness that scared Ronan. 

He was in the hazy dream state, (this was a dream where he wouldn’t bring stuff back) that muffled his mind and blurred the fine details of what was happening around him. Still though, he clearly saw this older Adam in the same field, picking strawberries now. 

“Why are you here?” Ronan asked.

The Adam in front of him smiled and said nothing. He only picked more strawberries and placed them in the basket. 

“Seriously. I know you’re here a lot but why are you older again?” 

Adam kept plucking but faltered now and looked at Ronan once more. 

“Eat this,” Adam replied and picked a strawberry up from the basket to put to Ronan’s lips. 

“Your fingers are rougher,” Ronan observed when he finished chewing. He felt them brush against his lips and chin. 

“It happens,” Adam said smiling.

He placed another strawberry in Ronan’s mouth. They were perfectly ripe and exploded with flavor and juice on Ronan’s tongue. 

“Tamquam-“ Adam said. 

“No,” Ronan replied, “You can’t go so soon again.” 

“Tamquam-“

“No,” Ronan said firmly.

“Tamquam-“ Adam repeated once more, softly.

Ronan sighed.

“Alter Idem.”

-

Same fucking field. 

Only this dream was less hazy then the last one. If Ronan really focused, he could probably bring something back. 

With the dream less hazy, Ronan could also see clearer the fields of dry grass that expanded long and across. In the distance he could see something that dimly resembled the Barns but it was so far, he couldn’t be sure. 

He wasn’t in the middle of the fields this time, but instead on a small crescent hill. Adam was here also, picking apples from a tree that stood on the hill. 

He was older again, dressed in nothing but overalls. His arms extended high above him to get an apple he couldn’t quite reach.

“Let me,” Ronan said and stood up from where he was perched in the grass. 

Adam smiled and stepped back to let him. 

Ronan walked to Adam and mirrored his position before grabbing the apple easily. As he grabbed onto the apple he felt the soft leaves of the tree brush against his fingertips before they lightly brushed away as Ronan tore the apple from the tree.

If this version of Adam would hold true, it seemed that Adam wouldn’t grow at all after graduating college, so Ronan would still have a healthy inch or so on him. 

Standing so close to Adam, he took in his scent. It was something that Ronan knew was distinctly his and had most likely remained so. But with it he also took in the scent of the Barns and the intoxicating smell of gasoline. All three things Ronan found solace in rolled into one. 

“You’re older. The Adam I know is nineteen. You look like you’re in your late twenties,” Ronan said, still standing beside Adam but facing him now.

“That would be true,” Adam said which was neither here nor there.

“You’re not the Adam I know.” 

“That would also be true,” Adam grabbed an apple from his basket, “Eat this.” 

He placed the apple against Ronan’s lips, applying pressure. But Ronan didn’t bite into it.

“I’m not eating anything until I understand what’s going on,” Ronan said against the apple. 

“You haven’t been looking very well into it. Eat this,” Adam repeated. 

Ronan begrudgingly took a bite from the apple. They weren’t his favorite fruit but they tasted much better in this dream then in the real world. Juicier and sweeter. 

“Tamquam-“ Adam said. 

“Not again,” Ronan groaned. 

“Tamquam-“ he repeated. 

“Alter idem,” Ronan replied, and woke up with the leaves from the apple tree in his bed.

-

Now this was different. 

Same Adam, different setting. 

The place they were in was surrounded by trees on every side but the spot Ronan appeared in the dream left a circular clearing.

There was a pond of water in the clearing. It was still and peaceful looking. Ronan wanted to float in it. 

Adam was in the middle, taking sips of water between his cupped palms. He wasn’t wearing his overalls but a pair of swim trunks. 

Ronan couldn’t put together why older Adam continued to visit him. He never thought about these dreams after he had them because it messed with his head. And it was intensely awkward thinking about this older version of Adam that befuddled Ronan when the Adam he knew and loved was in front of him. 

“Care to join me?” Adam asked, turning around. 

Ronan glanced over his chest with curiosity. He wasn’t built extremely different from the Adam he knew but again, he looked fuller somehow. 

This Adam was so similar but so different than the Adam he knew. He was just bigger. Not in the sense of body, but in the sense of aura and personality. His Adam was already so intense, but this Adam was even more somehow.

“Sure,” Ronan said, feeling oddly agreeable. 

He was already in swim trunks as well, something Ronan hasn’t noticed until now. 

He dipped into the water. It was a perfect temperature; nice and cool while the sun beat down on the two of them. 

“You’ll get there soon,” Adam said. 

Ronan didn’t really know what he meant, and told Adam so.

“Where you are now but better. Later though,” Adam said. “You’ll get there. With him- me,” he stuttered laughing lightly.

“Now what the hell does that mean?” Ronan asked, standing up straighter, walls coming up, claws extending. 

“It means what I said,” Adam replied.

“Enough with this vague- bullshit- mindfuckery. Say what you fucking mean.” 

“It’s your mind Ronan. You’re twisting thoughts in your head. Think what you actually think and stop guarding yourself.” 

“I want out,” Ronan said, he was pissed off now.

“Look up Ronan. There’s more to come. That’s all it means.” 

“I just gotta say the magic words right? Tamquam-“

Adam sighed but looked up at Ronan.

“Alter idem.” 

-

Old Adam, old Adam, old Adam.

It was too strange a thought outside his dream state, this older Adam. But he didn’t know why he thought it was strange. Why this image of older Adam befuddled him so much. Why it made him so angry.

_People get old,_ he told himself. _It’s nothing new._

_Not your people,_ his mind told him. _Your people are born to die._

-

Ronan thought a part of him was beginning to understand it. 

“You’re only here to torture me,” Ronan said. 

“What now?” Old Adam asked. He was breaking a banana piece by piece and placing each one in his mouth.

They were back in the fields of the Barns. But closer to the haystacks besides one of the outer Barns. Adam was seated on one of the haystacks, Ronan on the ground. 

“You’re only here because my subconscious thought it would be amazing to remind me I can’t grow old with you.” 

“Now that’s not. . .” Adam signed, “That’s not right.” 

“Isn’t it?” Ronan asked. “You’re here as a reminder for what I’m missing out on. Get out, get out, get out.”

“Ronan.”

Ronan looked at Adam. 

“Eat this,” he said, offering Ronan a piece. 

“Oh for fucks sake!” 

Adam sighed. 

“Why won’t you just say it? Just say it and be done with it. ‘I’m here to fuck you up’ and you’re done! The sooner you say it the sooner I’ll be finished with you,” Ronan said, gesturing with his arms and backing from Adam as he spoke.

“Because that’s not why I’m here. You’re on the right track, but you’ve come up with the wrong answer.” 

“Tamquam-“ Ronan ground out. 

“Now is this really how you’re gonna-“

“Tamquam-“ he repeated. 

“Alter idem,” Adam replied. 

-

He only saw a glimpse of older Adam for a second before the word came out of his mouth.

“Tamquam-“

“Ronan seriously?” 

Ronan could only hear Adam. He had his eyes screwed shut like a two year old. He had only glimpsed Adam in his normal overalls, back in the fields they started in.

“Tamquam-“ 

“The more you run, the further away you are from the answer.” 

“Tamquam-“

“Alter idem,” Adam growled. 

-

This was stupid.

_Get him out of my head,_ he pleaded. _I can’t handle it. I can’t see him. He is everything I’m gonna miss._

_It’s what you deserve,_ the voices hissed at him. 

_It’s not. Not after all of this,_ Ronan thought. 

He thought long and hard about it for another thirty minutes when his Adam came behind him.

“What are you thinking about?” Adam asked. 

Ronan now noted how the older Adams voice was huskier, and held some Henrietta drawl. Like it crawled back to Adam no matter how successfully he thought he masked it. 

Just another thing he would miss. 

“A dream,” Ronan said, still looking out the window. 

Adam hummed and asked if Ronan wanted to talk about it. 

“No. Not right now,” he said. 

“Okay,” Adam replied, before kissing Ronan’s neck and trailing a finger down his back as he walked away. 

It was then that the answer dawned on him. As unrealistic as it was. 

-

“You’re an opportunity.” 

This was the first thing to slip out of Ronan’s mouth as he woke in the dream and was greeted by older Adam. 

“Go on,” Adam smiled lightly. 

They were on the porch of the barns, both in rocking chairs. Adam was eating raspberries out of a bowl on the table between the two of them. He was wearing a simple white shirt and heavily washed jeans. 

“You’re something I can seize. Something I can grab and hold if I’m lucky,” Ronan said. 

“You’re close,” Adam said. 

“What do you mean?”

“I am something you can seize. I am an opportunity.”

“That’s what I said.”

“You said if,” Adam said, placing another raspberry in his mouth. “I am not if. I am eventually.”

“That’s not true,” Ronan shook his head, “You are an if. If I play my cards right, we'll both get old together and I’ll be able to be with you just as you are like this as time goes on.” 

“Listen to me Ronan. You will get there. You can’t go into this with a mindset like that. Adam won’t enjoy that.” 

“You _are_ Adam!”

“And _I’m_ not enjoying this.”

“Why are you doing this to me?” Ronan asked, tears forming in his eyes. 

“Ask yourself that question. I’m a product of your mind Ronan.” 

“No you’re not,” Ronan cried, “You’re Adam. You’re older and you’re different but you’re Adam.” 

“You’ll grow Ronan,” Adam said abruptly. “I know you think you’re doomed but you’ll grow. You and Adam will grow together. You’re not gonna be stuck like this forever.”

“Stop feeding me lies!” 

“Why is that so bad? If they were lies. Why is it so bad to hear them?” 

“Because, you’ll make me believe I can. That I can and will grow old with Adam. And I can’t handle the hurt that’ll come from that.” 

“Remember one thing Ronan. You are not doomed. You have the ability to change something and that’s what you’ll do. Don’t let your old thoughts clog your conscience.” 

He thought if he really tried he could believe Adam. If he really tried he could. 

Ronan cried harder and wrapped his arms around himself. 

“Ronan,” Adam said, voice coming from the front of him. 

Ronan looked up and Adam laid his hands on each side of Ronan’s face, thumbs tucked under his eyes.

“You’ll get there. Trust me, you will.” 

Ronan cried more.

“Tamquam-“

“Don’t go.” 

“Tamquam-“ Adam repeated, looking down at Ronan with such intense sadness. 

“Please. Please don’t go,” Ronan wrapped his arms around Adams waist. 

“You’ll see me soon,” Adam said. “I promise. . .” 

“Tamquam,” Adam repeated one more time.

“Alter idem.” Ronan said and knew it was the last time he would see old Adam. 

Whether that was in dream form or not, Ronan didn’t know.

-

When Ronan woke from that dream, he got up so abruptly, he’d also woken Adam.

“What’s wrong?” Adam asked, reaching for a dream light to ignite. 

“Dream,” Ronan waved his hand, not explaining it.

“You’re okay,” Adam said and wrapped his arms around Ronan from behind, pulling him close to himself. 

“You’re okay,” Adam repeated, voice thick with sleep, hand running slowly up and down Ronan’s upper arm. 

“We’ll get there Adam I swear,” Ronan whispered. 

“What?” Adam asked, voice halfway taken under sleeps spell.

“I’ll try my best,” Ronan whispered and placed a strong kiss on Adams hand before clutching it close to his chest.

“Tamqaum-“ Adam mumbled.

“Alter idem,” Ronan said and fell asleep.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! Again, please keep up with the BLM movement. 
> 
> Constructive criticism in the comments make me smile. 
> 
> Wash your hands, stay safe, and keep informed. Much love <3


End file.
